Annihilation

Locations
Call Number: Science Fiction / VanderMeer, Jeff, Adult Book / Fiction / Science Fiction / General / VanderMeer, Jeff
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Science Fiction / VanderMeer, Jeff	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Science Fiction / VanderMeer, Jeff	4-week checkout	Due 05-14-2024
Malletts Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Science Fiction / General / VanderMeer, Jeff	4-week checkout	Due 05-12-2024

Area X has claimed the lives of members of eleven expeditions. The twelfth expedition consisting of four women hopes to map the terrain and collect specimens; to record all their observations, scientific and otherwise, of their surroundings and of one another; and, above all, to avoid being contaminated by Area X itself.

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COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Simultaneously weird and bland. submitted by eknapp on November 16, 2016, 9:25am A team of scientists ventures into Area X, an ill-defined but mysteriously mysterious region of coastal Florida. The members of the eleven previous expeditions all experienced some combination of acute amnesia, aggressive cancer, violent psychosis, and bloody death.

The setup is pretty Lost-like: an isolated group in the wild, out of contact with the real world, in a strange place and beset by odd, possibly supernatural happenings. A lighthouse jerry-rigged as a fortress, riddled with bullet holes. A pile of expedition journals, far more than eleven expeditions can account for. A monster moaning in the woods. A spore that makes the inhaler glow green and grow stronger. And an impossibly long tunnel, the walls of which are lined with non-sensical writing composed of plant and fungus matter: "Where lies the strangling fruit that came from the hand of the sinner I shall bring forth the seeds of the dead to share with the worms that...."

The first-person writing is extremely bland, very dry. The narrator comes across as having an undiagnosed personality disorder. Or maybe she's on heavy anti-depressants.

A lot of plot points don't ring true or are poorly justified, such as: the awesome mind-warping power of...HYPNOSIS; the party members not knowing one another's names, simply referring to themselves as 'the biologist', 'the anthropologist', etc; their contentment to rely on old technology for no apparent reason.

In spite of my numerous complaints, Annihilation's oddness is intriguing and it was a relatively quick and easy read. I might finish the trilogy someday.

very intriguing submitted by KOH on August 28, 2017, 7:49pm I had a hard time visualizing this as I read it, but I liked the creepy themes.

Tower or tunnel? submitted by mnwong on June 18, 2018, 9:39pm Annihilation was my favorite book of the Southern Reach trilogy. It could pretty much be a standalone story. The otherworldly imagery is a mixture of terror and beauty.

Bland submitted by Aveliney on June 19, 2018, 10:01am I found myself wishing for some exposition. I was confused and found this book very odd.

Strange but good submitted by BurntSaori on July 20, 2018, 1:46pm To have an all female expedition of scientists in a strange sci fi world and not know what any of their boobs looked like was worth the read by itself. Solid book.

More detailed but also less fleshed out than the movie submitted by stantongockelhannah on March 4, 2022, 9:35am Annihilation the book is told from the first person “biologist” perspective, a person who is either telling this story in real time, or as a reflection after their alien encounter. It’s hard to say which because time doesn’t really exist as we know it in Area X. Other reviewers comment on the blandness of the narrator, which didn’t bother me so much, especially because the author spends so much time discussing how disconnected and far away her husband is when he returns. All that is to say, who is actually narrating? Do we even know?

If you’ve seen the movie you’ll get more character development from all characters, which I did miss from the book. However the book obsessively details the tower/tunnel, and you begin to see the world as a trained biologist sees it. The story reminds me of Melancholia, where everyone is depressed and deals with impending doom in their own way. It’s a quick read but not the most riveting book I’ve ever read.

Heavier on the psychological horror and lighter on the spooky plants and animals than you might expect submitted by eilusk on August 6, 2022, 3:56pm It's been a few years since I read this book, and most of what I remember from it are psychological details (like characters feeling strongly that the stairs leading down are a buried tower, and calling it a "tower" instead of a tunnel or a pit). The wilderness setting is evocative, and it's much more than just a backdrop to the story, but the story is really more about grief and purpose and identity or whatever, and I feel like you really have to engage with the biologist's emotions and internal monologue to get that kind of stuff. I think it holds up as a pretty good scifi/horror book if you don't "get it", but I never felt like I was really picking up what the story was trying to tell me.

This book is so weird and I love it submitted by clk.9123 on August 10, 2023, 11:52am I absolutely loved this book; but please be advised that it is quite strange. It is definitely a different sort of horror, best described I think as a combination of gothic horror, psychological horror, and environmental horror. At times it is truly hard to fully understand what is happening, the narrators are sort of unreliable so it's up to you to piece things together in some parts but I think that's what makes it so brilliant. This is an excellent book to read as a book club, especially for groups that like sci fi and/or anything horror. There is so much to analyze and pick apart, and it's a good book to have someone else to discuss things with! A quick note that the movie really doesn't even compare to the depth found in this book.